Newspaper publisher Knight Ridder Inc., which is being sold to McClatchy Co., posted sharply lower first-quarter earnings Monday on weaker advertising -- particularly at three of the 12 newspapers McClatchy is not keeping -- and factors including higher interest costs. San Jose-based Knight Ridder earned $28.4 million, or 42 cents a share, in the first three months of the year, down from $60.5 million, or 79 cents, a year earlier.

Newspapers saw increases in classified advertising as well as ads on their websites, according to preliminary estimates by the Newspaper Assn. of America. Ad spending for newspapers, including their websites, inched up 2.4% to $12 billion for the third quarter of 2005 when compared with the year-earlier quarter. Spending for print ads was up 1.6% to $11.4 billion compared with the third quarter of 2004. Classified ad spending was up 5.5%.

Bestselling American crime writer Patricia Cornwell has taken out full-page newspaper ads to defend her investigation into solving a 19th century killing spree. The ads in two British national newspapers on Saturday came days after one of the papers accused her of having an "obsession" with the Jack the Ripper case.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., hurt by sluggish sales over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, launched a rare advertising blitz in newspapers across the United States touting price cuts. The No. 1 U.S. retailer took out full-page color ads in newspapers in as many as 50 markets to promote price cuts of up to a third on such diverse products as portable DVD players, appliances, tools and Elmo toys. The ad campaign follows poor November sales reported by the retailer. Shares of Bentonville, Ark.

Tribune Co. said Thursday that it had found additional errors in circulation figures for its Newsday and Hoy newspapers and set aside $35 million to compensate advertisers that may have overpaid. An internal investigation found more circulation inaccuracies in 2003 and 2004 as well as misstatements for 2001 and 2002, said Tribune, whose holdings include the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times.

Plagued by allegations of misconduct and facing a federal investigation, Boeing Co. is expected to run a full-page ad in newspapers today featuring an open letter that defends the company's "integrity" and "honesty." By taking the unusual step of moving the debate over ethics in the defense business to a public forum, Boeing also is acknowledging for the first time publicly that some of its employees "behaved unethically" when it outbid rival Lockheed Martin Corp.

Cardinal Roger M. Mahony will be featured this week in full-page ads in three Los Angeles newspapers, reassuring the public that he is taking significant steps to prevent future abuse by priests in his archdiocese. Written as an open letter to residents of Los Angeles and surrounding communities, Mahony repeats many proposals previously announced in news conferences and interviews. The cardinal's newly hired public relations firm, Sitrick and Co.

The drop-off in advertising spending accelerated during the third quarter, with network television and national newspapers clearly feeling the effects of the Sept. 11 attacks, according to a widely watched survey released Monday. Overall ad spending during the first nine months of the year fell by 7.8%, to $68.8 billion, according to market research firm CMR, a New York-based division of Taylor Nelson Sofres.

Top media companies said Monday they saw no end in sight to the worst advertising downturn the newspaper industry has seen in more than a decade. Several media executives, lined up before Wall Street analysts, painted a gloomy picture of their industry and said that though they probably will hit their estimates for the year, they won't do it without a good degree of pain. Draconian cost-cutting, layoffs and rethinking of capital spending seemed to be the order of the day. Dow Jones & Co.

David Horowitz fully intended to provoke debate when he sent college newspapers a full-page advertisement denouncing calls for reparations to black Americans for slavery. But even Horowitz, a conservative Los Angeles author and activist, says he has been stunned--though somewhat pleasantly, he acknowledged--by the flaming controversy he managed to ignite.